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Seminole County Public schools in Florida were being sponsored by local McDonalds restaurants, also located in Seminole County, by rewarding children's good report cards with free Happy Meals. The program, called Made the Grade, was aimed toward children from kindergarten through fifth grade who earned good grades and had good attendance in school, could bring their report card to a local McDonald’s and receive a happy meal. The promotion for the Made the Grade program was printed on the report card sleeve and showed Ronald McDonald; the Golden Arches; and a listing of Happy Meal items.
The promotion was ended by the McDonald’s Corporation shortly after complaints from one of the children’s parents and an advocacy group, Campaign for Commercial Free Childhood. The complaint was towards Seminole county encouraging poor eating habits and McDonalds for advertising to children and promoting the link between unhealthy foods and school performance, plus overall this does not help with childhood obesity. McDonalds along with 12 other large food and beverage companies signed a Council of Better Business Bureaus that would restrict them from advertising to children; the pledge starts 1 January 2008.
I feel that the promotion of any unhealthy food is unethical within the school system, reason being with the obesity crisis the encouragement of fat laden, sugar loaded foods is poisoning children. Children should be encouraged to eat healthy foods that will give them the most benefit to their health. If I was the marketing manager for the school system I would make the changes that parents requested and still keep the Made the Grade program like Seminole County school system did, but research and promote a food based reward system that would not advertise unethical items or services that could be unhealthy or unsafe to children.
As a parent, how would you feel about companies promoting products or services to your child that could be deemed unethical?
Graphic/Photograph Credit:
Sabrina Segal
1. mamamarcy |Dec. 15, 2010 @ 6:43 PM
The other night I watched a movie called "SUPER SIZE ME", where this gentleman vowed to eat MCDonald's for an entire month. The results of this experiment were scary as he experienced everything from weight gain, to other health issues and lack of energy. (I don't think McDonald's Marketing team was pleased with the movie), The program even went into one of the schools and saw what foods this school served their kids. It was very unhealthy. Their behavior declined physically as well as academically.
On the other hand there was other school for troubled youth, where the principal decided to serve healthy foods such as fruits, vegetables, meals prepared from scratch (not from a box), etc, and to see these students you would have never recognized them. Healthy eating habits helped these children to concentrate better, and they also had more energy without "burnout".
I do think that children in schools should be rewarded for good grades. Right now Pizza Hut has a program where if children read so many books that the children receive a free small pan pizza. Children love pizza and as a result are excited about reading! Do you think this promotes unhealthy eating habits? I don't. This program has been around since I was in school, and it encouraged me to read more! Why, because I wanted to earn that free personal pan pizza.
I do believe that some things should be done in moderation, or as little as possible. Even this evening, I ade a home cooked meal for my "baby girl", and she prefers my cooking over going to MCDonald's. To me that speaks volumes. My point is, if the marketing team won't promote a healthy lifestyle, us parents can by the healthy meals we prepare.